This is the first in a series of Guest Posts from various friends of mine. I love visiting France and certainly enjoy my food, so this post is a great combination for me. Enjoy!

If you are visiting France it definitely worth visiting the french countryside. The french countryside towns are beautiful. There are various french countryside tours that operate, but it is a fantastic experience to explore little villages that have been around forever.

So many dishes come from France and different regions of France. It is not surprising since it is the country where cooking originated from. You could be eating something really simple, but little did you know that it was a signature dish of a famous chef in a michelin restaurant somewhere in Paris. Culinary schools all over the world develop their syllabus around a set of dishes that are very French in nature and what the students decide to do when they graduate in terms of adaption is up to them.

There is something about french countryside dishes that is so unique from other parts of the world. French chefs seems to whip up a plate of food with such ease and in the countryside you feel right at home because the food they serve is still 5 star, but without all the crystals and candles you are used to at a top hotel, which often makes it more pretentious. After all you are here to focus on the food.

Coq au vin

Coq au vin is famous all over France. It is most popular in Burgundy, therefore wines from this area are used. The secret to this recipe is to leave the pot in the oven for a few hours so that the flavors intensify and the meat falls off the bone.

Foie Gras

A luxurious delicacy that a lot of people don’t agree with. This is goose liver and the way it is achieved is that the goose has been fattened to get a descent sized liver. It is extremely rich. People enjoy foie gras in a mousse or parfait with a flavoring of truffles, but there are many more options.

If you enjoyed this post try the following from the same writer.

French countryside

The Jungfrau, Swiss Alps

“‘Caveat Emptor’ means the buyer can not recover costs from the seller for defects that render a property unfit, unless the seller actively makes misrepresentations amounting to fraud. Applying this to advice given in these pages mean that you, the reader, are responsible for any advice you take, not the giver, unless he knowingly gives bad advice. You make the decision to accept advice, on whatever basis you choose, or not.”

Through these pages in ‘Earth Pilgrim’ I am giving advice based on my experience. You could be hesitant about the advice because you don’t know me or you feel you don’t know my intentions.

What do you do? Do you wait until you know more about me or do you jump in and apply it to your life?

I went on to say,

“But this responsibility for taking care with what advice you take has become a wariness against taking almost any advice. Virgil coined the phrase ‘beware of Greeks bearing gifts‘ about the ‘Trojan Horse’ left at the gates of Troy. The Trojans thought the Greeks had left a parting gift because they had given up and sailed home. They took it within their walls not knowing it was filled with armed soldiers who would destroy their city. Applying this means that you, the reader are automatically suspicious of any advice given and the writer has the responsibility to show he is giving good advice.”

Make your own decision but don’t just hang back because you are wary. I know I have a responsibility to show I am giving good advice, but don’t wait for me. Look at your life and decide.

Before you go read the post and let me know what you think by commenting on it.

This fabulous animation illustrates a talk on the subject. Listen and learn and, most of all, enjoy.

What do you think? Do you agree? Is there a chance for us?

Find Your Audience. Find Their Needs.

To find your audience, the first step of the business of writing, is similar to the first step of business success. In business, the first step is gauging supply and demand–understanding the needs of a certain group of people, and determining whether those needs have been sufficiently met. If the needs are unfulfilled, you’ve found an opportunity. Although the connection is seldom drawn, the first step of writing for money is similar.

Here’s the breakdown:

• Understand your core strengths and interests – Take an inventory of your skills and interests and make a list of the kinds of writing that complements them well.
• Find your audience and its commercial potential – What audiences would be most interested in the writing you’d like to do? Is your audience target too narrow? Is it too wide? What are the needs of your audience?
• Determine what you’re going to write – Choose to write something that deeply sparks your interest and appeals to an audience with large commercial potential. Remember, you’re not selling out if you write what you’re passionate about.

Understand your Core Strengths and Interests

There’s a reason why Heinz doesn’t make computer software, and Microsoft doesn’t make ketchup. They have decidedly different core strengths and interests. Indeed, if Microsoft announced that it was going to buy Heinz and get into the condiment business, its stock would plummet. The reason being is that Microsoft simply doesn’t have the infrastructure, technology, or expertise to survive in the condiment business. Books on business history are replete with instances of corporations who, sitting on piles of excess cash, decided to buy businesses that had nothing to do with its core strengths. They called it “diversification,” but in reality it was, as the financier Peter Lynch termed it, “diworsification.” These companies, straying from their core businesses, ended up doing quite poorly.

Although the core strengths for multi-billion dollar corporations are much easier to determine than the core strengths of a writer, the same principle applies. A writer must focus on core strengths in order to provide the best possible writing for his or her target audience.

There are four areas of consideration when making lists of writing strengths. They are:

• Genres – Do you write Science fiction? Romance novels? Historical fiction? Make a list of all genres that attract you. Perhaps you are drawn to several genres. In which genre do you feel your writing most original?
• Themes – What themes does your writing express? Although the subject matter may vary widely story to story, you may that find your writing expresses several of the same themes. When listing themes from your stories, see if you can order them from most frequent to least frequent. If you find you’re writing a lot of stories about redemption, for example, that might be an area to give some thought to.
• Subjects – What subject matter do you enjoy covering? If you’re a fantasy writer do you write about magical rituals or strange beasts? Are your science fiction novels about galactic wars or about the development of artificial intelligence?
• Mediums – Do you enjoy writing screenplays, short stories, novels, or poetry? Perhaps you’re a blogger or a spoken-word storyteller. Maybe you do freelance writing for travel magazines. What mediums do you frequently work with or would like to work with?

The key here at this stage is not to determine whether romance novels are more profitable a genre to work with than science fiction novels, but to determine which would be more profitable if you wrote them. If you perceive romance novels to be more profitable than science fiction and write romance simply on that basis, your work will most likely suffer. If you truly love writing romances, then write them, but if you’re secretly nursing a love for science fiction while pumping out harlequin paperbacks, chances are you’ll be less successful than if you fully developed your style in science fiction. You’ll be less happy too. Remember, Heinz may not be a 70-billion dollar giant like Microsoft, but at 10 billion dollars it’s the undisputed leader of ketchup. There’s nothing wrong with being the big fish in the smaller pond.

When brainstorming your core strengths and interests the idea is to get it all out there on paper so that you’re face to face with everything that you could possibly write. After you’ve brainstormed, circle the genres, themes, and subjects that you feel resonate with you the most. These are the areas in writing where you should focus on developing your skill and your craft–your core competence, if you like.

Remember, passion is more important than skill. If you’re incredibly passionate about a certain genre or subject, but have not endeavored to write in that particular area, that’s not a reason to avoid doing it. Your passion will drive you to acquire the skills that you need to become the best.

One tool that I have found remarkably useful in determining my core strengths and interests has been the book “Is your Genius at Work?” by Dick Richards. The exercises in the book have provided me with remarkable clarity not only in regards to my writing, but also to my life in general. I recommend it to anyone who is still unclear about what their core strengths might be. For more on the book you can read my review.

Find your Audience and its Commercial Potential

In business, before a product even reaches the planning stage, millions of dollars are spent on market research to not only to find what markets are out there, but to determine which market would be the easiest to target. In writing, to consider a target market is to make an educated guess as to whether your writing will have narrow or broad appeal. To have narrow appeal is fine so long as you’re sure the audience that you’re appealing to will like it. If your new book, for example, is likely only to appeal to teenage mothers and their parents, that’s fine. Because your book is targeted directly toward this audience and because few other books are, you’re very likely going to capture the attention of this niche. Be careful, however, not to go too narrow. You may write a book about the Chilean fishing industry, and your book may very well become popular among English-speaking expats living on the Chilean coast, but since this particular group is so small, the number of your readers probably wont go past triple digits.

Conversely, you don’t want to go too broad. As opposed to going too narrow, where you’ll get a limited number of loyal readers, when you go too broad no one will really know what you’re talking about. In essence, you’re reaching out to too many audiences at once. In doing so, you alienate them all. For example, let’s say you decide to write a science fiction novel about an interstellar war, biological engineering, cybernetic implants, dystopias, alien slave uprisings and robot/human romances. Chances are that if your novel isn’t 2,000 pages long you won’t be able to do justice to each subject you cover. Indeed, a reader will finish your book thinking: what was that book actually about? Many writers will tend to go more narrow than broad, but there is a tendency to cover every subject and theme that interests them in a single monstrous novel. This would be like a commercial internet site covering the subject of “travel” without really getting into detail about what kind of travel. Travel where? Asia? Africa? Europe? City nightlife? Seaside getaways? Usually a person surfing the ‘net will only be looking for one or two of the above. If they stumble upon a website that doesn’t clearly state what kind of information it offers because its simply all over the place, they’ll click the back button before trying to figure it out.

Also, you should consider how well covered your market is. It’s true that there’s a healthy demand for razor blades, but if you even thought about making your own razor blade company, Gillette and Schick would stamp your business out before your product hit the shelves. This is basically the idea of mature markets, where it is nearly impossible for newcomers to break in. This idea can be clearly seen in the business of writing as well. Even if you had the greatest idea for a legal thriller, you probably won’t sell too many copies because John Grisham has done well to fulfill the needs of his audience. He’s written 18 books in the genre and has consistently turned out new ones every 1 to 2 years. Add to this all the others who have tried to cash in on this market by writing similar books and you’ve got the demand for legal thrillers well covered. Even if your legal thriller was well-crafted, if you don’t significantly differentiate your book from the others, you’ll have difficulty standing out from the competition.

Now that we have some guidelines for what an audience with high commercial potential is, how do we determine what kinds of writing these audiences would be receptive to? How can we determine their needs? For non-fiction it can be quite easy. Let’s say you were a financial historian and everyone these days is talking about financial wrongdoings on Wall Street. If you check the market of the books that are currently out there and you find that you can provide perspective on financial wrongdoing that hasn’t been written about, you would probably have a bestseller. For my blog, I perceived the need that writers and creative people have for better vision, discipline, and control of the creative process. I fell into the business world and came back with knowledge and experience that I felt was valuable for creative people. I also saw that many creative people found themselves in jobs that were wrong for them. I saw this as a chance to provide support for their transition back to a career they truly love.

In fiction understanding an audience’s needs is not so easy. You have to tap into a zeitgeist, a general need in the collective unconscious. There are two ways to go about this: by intuition and analysis. Intuition requires meditating on this question “At this moment in time, what kind of story does my audience need to hear?” If you spend a little time focusing your attention on this question each day, your subconscious mind will be on the lookout for data in the media and the general themes of people’s conversations. This data will percolate until you find yourself seized by a great idea. When this idea comes to you, use your intuition to confirm its value. Ask yourself: “Does this story tap into an unfulfilled need?” If your gut tells you yes, trust it. You probably have a winner on your hands.

The analytic approach, on the other hand, is a method frequently employed by the marketing departments of large corporations and market research firms. They utilize focus groups and nationwide surveys to ensure that the public will react positively to whatever product they’re developing. In general, I believe the intuitive approach is best when you have a marketing staff of just you and yourself. The analytic approach, however, does have its uses for a writer. You could, for example, go on Google or Amazon and look for books that might have a similar audience as the book that you’re going to write. Check out Amazon rankings and see how many copies the best books targeted to your audience are selling. The information you find by researching on the internet can be superficial, but it does give some perspective. Also, it can guide the direction of your intuitive analysis.

Does finding the needs of your audience have to be so difficult? What about the uninspired garbage that Hollywood studios pump out? The truth of the matter is that Hollywood is a firm believer of the analytic approach. They go with the formulaic dramas that have proven to sell over the ages. The needs of their target audiences are shallow and insatiable–the psychosocial equivalent of potato chips. This is why movies with sex and violence are so successful. They tap into obvious psychic needs which haven’t changed much from the beginning of time. This is why studio executives are willing to pay $100,000 plus for an unoriginal movie script that they know will sell. It’s “cash for trash” as they say in the business. If you’ve gotten this far in this article, you’re probably not so interested in writing movies that will be the big summer hit one year and forgotten the next year. However, if your only interest is in making money, tapping in to the “sure thing” markets of sex, big explosions, and screwball comedies are your best bet. Many writers who have done little to develop their talents have made very comfortable livings doing just that.

Once you’ve brainstormed a list of your core strengths and interests, determined possible audiences, and thought about their needs, the next step is to…

Determine What You’re Going to Write

Focus on the top three to five of your core skills and interests: genres, subjects, themes and mediums that you care about the most. From these three to five which of them has the highest commercial potential? You will probably have to examine each one by one

What’s the main factor in deciding what you’re going to write? Simple, go with your passion! The writing that you’re most passionate about will tend to be your best. If you’d like to be a poet, then go be a poet. Just don’t hold any illusions that you can make a comfortable living writing free verse. Unfortunately, the audience for poetry is on the very narrow end of the spectrum.

Before you decide that your passion for writing lies in an area with low commercial potential, be sure to seriously consider other areas where your writing talents can be applied. You may find that it’s not the poetry you love but the themes that you convey with your poetry. Many people fall in love with poetry, short story writing, or screenplay writing because it was the first medium they tried and found they were good at. It can be difficult to change your medium from poetry to short story writing when you’ve spent so much time developing your poetry skills.

My medium of choice for the longest time was fiction. Indeed, at the time, I had no interest in any other genre. However, when I went back to writing after my five year detour in Japan, I realized that my passion for writing non-fiction and blogging was just as strong as it was for writing fiction. I love writing fiction, but I realized that the commercial potential of blogging and freelance writing was much higher than fiction. Because my passion for both is about the same, I went with the area that would provide me the largest promise of potential income. I will probably continue to write fiction but right now my focus is here with this site and developing my freelance writing business.

An Ongoing Process

Although to find your audience and understand their needs is labeled as step one of writing for money, in reality it’s an ongoing process. The success of the writing that you actually publish will help you to evaluate how well you did in the first step. More often then not, you’ll continue to reevaluate your core strengths and interests as a writer. As you write and gauge the success of your writing, you’ll have a better idea who your target audience is and whether or not your audience has commercial potential. If it doesn’t, see if you can change what you’re going to write and still be passionate about it. If you sincerely believe that you can’t change from less profitable writing to more profitable writing because it conflicts with your values as a writer, that’s fine. It’s important, however, to make this decision after you consciously assess those values

(Kenji Crosland is a creative writing major who, scared of becoming a starving artist, became a corporate headhunter in Tokyo. Since then he’s regained his sanity, quit his job, and now blogs about creating an ideal career at unreadyandwilling.com. He is also developing a web application that aims to help more artists and creative people make money online. Follow him on Twitter: @KenjiCrosland.

Going sightseeing on a bicycle is quite different from going sightseeing in a car, especially in the Netherlands, where 95% of the roads have designated cycle tracks and where many purely cycle roads exist. Through forest and field the cycle paths deviate from the roads, allowing for a relaxing time surrounded by nature without the noise and smell of cars.

We chose to cycle across the famous Delta Works, the sentinels of the country. The Delta Works are the latest technical marvel installed to hold back the sea. These great dams open and close allowing sea life to continue within this boundary while holding back the mass of water. Having travelled this long road, the only road along the coast, countless times by car, I thought I was familiar with the skyline of the giant steel structures reaching towards the sky.

This time things were very different, however. Much to my surprise, the cycle path ran over the top of the water works and along the highest point of the dikes. From high up the view is magnificent. To see the land stretching off to one side and the water on the other is very impressive. In one glance it became very clear that the water level of the North Sea is higher than the land of the Netherlands. You see why it is called “The Low Countries”. The difference in level is substantial and, when you see the sea stretching into the distance, quite frightening.

Graham is totally fascinated by the scale of what has been achieved here in regards to the protection of the land. I am too, but not to that extent. Being Dutch I have learned so much about it in school, I have come to regard it as normal. “The Netherlands lies below sea level” has become a noun that has lost its meaning, much like band names such as AC/DC or the Beatles have lost their original meaning. Who thinks of the little animals when we mention The Beatles?

Sharing this tour with Graham has made this part of the Netherlands come alive. It has also left me hovering between feeling proud regarding the giant steel constructions, a tribute to the power of man, and feeling fragile… will this last? One leak and all this land will be swallowed by water…

I went back to the UK for a week and took my bike with me. Going for a long ride I realised I had forgotten the difference with Holland:

In England you are either going up or down, you are never flat. That’s why the Dutch don’t seem to develop muscles when cycling.

In England there are cars – everywhere. (More coming on this!)

In England there are hedges! You can’t see the country you are cycling through. In Holland you have views, great views, even if they are flat!

When I first came here, as a car driver, I was shocked by the danger – to me. The culture is completely different, and difficult to get used to. If you are going to spend any time here you need to get used to it quickly.

1. No matter what happens you, the driver, are at fault. The law states so. This quickly becomes obvious. Cyclists just cycle wherever they want and totally ignore cars. You have to watch out for them or you will have an accident and then you are in trouble!
2. Mostly cycles are on dedicated cycle paths, safe from you, but there are real problems when they cross each other. Generally the cycle paths have priority and are marked as such. This is, for me, a real issue on the exits to roundabouts where I expect to drive unhindered. I was amazed to see that you have to stop, on the roundabout, and let cyclists through. This is dangerous for cars!
3. Often the cyclists were making eye contact with the driver, as they thought! I am in a right hand drive, British, car and they were looking at the passenger thinking they had been seen. Wow, eventually I realised what was happening and I found I had to look everywhere.

I thought I was home and dry until I realised I had an equal problem with other car drivers. Holland still works on the law that cars coming from the right have priority, even if it is a local road. I had a number of close shaves thinking I was safe on a main road.

There’s a lot to understanding other cultures, but once you get there it is great fun. I am getting fitter and browner in the summer sun cycling everywhere. Perhaps Spain will be OK for cycling too – although I have heard the drivers there just completely ignore cyclists – maybe that’s why they don’t really exist.

We’ll see!

The Midnight Coach for London departs. The bright red traffic lights, the road closure ahead – they are all irrelevant. I greet my trusted friends: neck pillow, earplugs & eye mask. I feel so happy inside. It has been a while since we have travelled, I think to myself. After settling into my seat, I lose myself in memories.

Two and a half months in the Netherlands have flown past. Months of working intensively, of joining forces with actors, director, musician, lighting designer and theatre to create my play. A time of drive, of inspiration, fun, learning and growing; of connecting with the other Moon Scouts, a nearby spiritual centre, several women groups; of long cycling tours; of philosophical discussions.

I am woken by the passenger beside me. My eyes squint in the bright lights. The red digi-letters show 3:28. Customs – twice. Back in my seat, I float off again.

Here I am on the bus to London. My project has finished; with raving reviews. The time to move on is approaching. A wonderful circle of friends has grown in a short period of time. I feel at home within the local community. At the same time, I am looking to the next adventure.

People know I’m only passing through. That doesn’t mean they keep their distance though, because I don’t.

One of the secrets of being an Earth Pilgrim is to deeply connect with those around you. Connect on a personal level. Connect like you will always be there. Because you are. It doesn’t matter whether it is only for an hour, a day or three months. It is all about how well you connect with people in the moment!

I think most people nowadays misunderstand this. With tools like texting, email, skype, VoIP and facebook, nobody really leaves anymore. You can keep in touch. True, but often these become tools to hide behind. Great, you can talk to people anywhere. But how about connecting to those around you, in the moment? That is still up to you!

This evening, in London, the colouring in the sky was phenomenal. On the train, no one was paying attention, they were all too busy “connecting” on their phones. Occasional glances were just thrown to check if I was watching them. Is that real?

Connecting is more than just texting, or spending hours together. Do you remember that lovely guy or couple you met on holiday? The same kind of people live next door to you, two houses down in the next block.

It is you who opens up when you are on the road. You can do the same at home. When you run into your neighbour next time, make an effort to go beyond: how are you – have a nice day. You’ll be surprised!

Even better: imagine really connecting with your partner – again, or maybe even for the first time. Now there’s a thought!

Spare five minutes, thirty minutes, even an hour and genuinely listen to what others have to say. All they want is to be heard. Your contribution to make the world a better place.

Everyone is an Earth Pilgrim, whether you are on the road or not.

It is frighteningly bold colour that denotes aggression tempered with cheerfulness. It’s the colour of the setting sun with all it’s power and beauty. It’s the colour of fire. The dutch show their total lack of taste in displaying it everywhere.

For me, coming from Britain, it has rather shocking connotations that create a totally different feel from the fun in Holland. My family are from Glasgow and before that Northern Ireland. We from a Protestant family, part of the ‘Plantation’ of Northern Ireland. This started as far back as Oliver Cromwell (1599-1688) who gave his troops tracts of land in Ireland to pay them off at the end of the English Civil War. Thus started a conflict that persists in Ireland still.

The situation was further engrained into popular mythology by the involvement of King Billy, as he is known. King William III of Orange (1650-1702) was ruler of Holland and, in order to defend Holland from the French, became involved with a struggle for the English, Irish and Scottish thrones against King James, a Catholic. He prevailed at the famous Battle of the Boyne in Ireland and became the saviour of the protestant/loyalist cause in Northern Ireland.

So, bizarrely, the colour of fun and pride in Holland has become a colour of hatred and bigotry in Northern Ireland.

So while I celebrate with the dutch football fans I remember the deaths and the hatred over hundreds of years involving the Loyal Orange Order in peculiar homage to a dutch King. But understand it… no, never.

(Thanks to Cheta Urmila for the photographs from Holland.)

Issues of ‘Conscious Living’, ‘Independent Working’ and ‘Travel Culture’.

There is so much writing and blogging in this area that the reader can get quickly overwhelmed, This  glance at what’s going on will help  understand the range of what is out there and help get some perspective.

Alex at Blogussion is a 16 year old with the kind of sharp, pithy thoughts only the young seem to have. In ‘Interviews are Boring, Reviews are Fake & Lists are Kind of Lame. Let’s Get Real‘ he takes a pop at all the bloggers out there who are lay in their writing, and there are many. I plough through a lot of stuff to find the material for this compilation, and sometimes I wonder if I am wasting my time! I love writing and I hope that I am putting me into the stuff I write, I suppose if not you won’t be here reading it.

For most of my life I have been a Lighting Designer, I am currently in Aylesbury, England to complete the lighting of a new theatre. My passion is light and lighting. Dave at Go Backpacking has just posted a great video on the ‘Berlin – Festival of Lights‘. Go and see, I promise you it’s worth it, great filming and cool music. Oh and the lighting’s good as well!

Jonathan Mead has a great site, Illuminated Mind full of advice about creating your own life or, as he puts it,

“To create a revolution based on authentic action. A movement of people liberating themselves through living on their own terms.”

In a recent post, ‘Lessons from One Year of Self Employment‘, he celebrates his one year anniversary of being self-employed. He draws the lessons he has learned. The first is the one I like,

“This may seem like an overly-simplistic lesson, but it’s probably the most important one that I’ve learned. Doing what you want and having your business and life be exactly the way you want it is possible. It just takes continual and deliberate direction.”

That continual and deliberate direction is one I am following.

Josh Fulmer at The Wander Project created a ‘Travel Blog’ before he started travelling. He has just posted that ‘The Wander Project is Dead‘. He does not find it interesting and worries about how it is going to affect his trip, he wants to just travel. For me this is a perfect example of the need to be authentic, only write about travel if that’s what you do, and the need for passion, only write about what you feel passionately about. I am passionate about travelling, it’s what I do all the time. Come back to it, Josh, when you are on your journey.

Nancie (LadyExpat) over at Budget Travellers Sandbox has a great time around South East Asia. I love her recent post, ‘Are Koreans More Polite When They’re Naked? — A Visit to a Korean Bathhouse’. I was interested in some of the comments about the problems of getting naked for Americans! I am staying in Holland at the moment where it is very acceptable to spend all day naked at the local sauna. You sit around in the sun, swim, sauna as well as drink and eat, all naked and mixed. It’s all very normal.

Anil Polat at Fox Nomad has been writing extensively on travel for four years now with a lot of great stuff there. He recently list ‘9 Unorthodox Travel Heroes‘. Despite what was said above of list posts I like this one because he takes the rare step of giving us some role models in our travelling. Let’s have lots more of these.